Winter Wonderland

Footprints in the first snowfall

This winter season is really throwing me for a loop this year. I was anticipating heavy snow, bone-chilling temperatures and a battle between us and mother nature. So far, we had one soft snowy day and it did not even stick to the ground. Don't get me wrong, I am totally happy not having to shovel my car out of the snow, but I was prepared to help our little hens tackle the winter.
   This is our first winter with the girls and so I wanted to make sure we were ready for the challenge. I did a lot of research in preparation of the colder months to understand the do's and don'ts for chicken keeping.
    Chickens are known for not being huge fans of snow. When we did have the one day of light snow fall the girls went outside and looked a little confused. They kept picking their tiny feet up and pecking the ground trying to understand what this cold white stuff was. Since we have been lucky without having a large amount of snow yet we haven't had to worry about the run as much. A few ideas of what to do when it does snow is you can cover the snow with some straw for the chickens to walk on. If the snow becomes deep, you will probably have to shovel an area for them to peck around and free range. If you have a smaller run, I have read other owners covered their run with a tarp to keep the snow off the ground. Our run is more of a larger fenced in area so we will be picking up our shovels and make a path for the ladies.
    Our coop is pretty much squared away since we are already doing the deep little method that adds extra insulation to keep the hens warm. You will want to make sure there is no draft in the coop. Chickens are able to sustain pretty cold temperatures by huddling together. It is easier for them to get warm in the winter with their natural down coats than to cool down in the summer. However, too much wind can cause the chickens to get frostbite and sick. If the wind is too much in the coop you can tarp the outside. It is important to make sure your coop has great ventilation since the hens might spend some more time inside than they normally do. If you see a build up of condensation on your coop windows, that means you do not have enough ventilation and need to come up with a way to get better air circulation.
Water is the enemy in colder months. It is sort of a catch twenty-two when it comes to water. You need to keep the coop as dry as possible to keep the hens healthy, yet you need to make sure the hens always have access to drinking water. The reason being, hens consume more food in the winter to keep their bodies warm and in turn drink more water. Water freezes. You can get a heated bowl that plugs in and keep the water at an above freezing temperature. Or you can make several trips from the inside to the outside changing out the frozen water for fresh water. (which we have been doing since the temps have been above freezing most nights). Another idea I read about is placing a ping pong ball in the water to keep the water in constant motion to prevent freezing. I have not tried that one yet!
 It is not recommended to insulate your coop. This can cause humidity and ammonia levels to increase which can cause your hens to become ill. If you purchase hearty birds they are built to handle colder temperatures. The only thing I would keep an eye on is their feet, wattles and combs to make sure they are not getting frostbite. These are areas of their bodies where they release heat. Our White Leghorns have larger combs so they are more susceptible to frostbite than our other hens since the combs are farther away from their bodies. To be proactive in preventing frostbit you can put petroleum jelly on these body parts to give them a layer of protection.
 Do not be surprised if your egg production decreases a little bit. The hens go through an adjustment with the season changes and sometimes they do not lay as frequently. They are getting use to temperature changes and the fact that in the winter it gets darker earlier. Hens usually need 12 hours of daylight to lay productively. Some owners place supplemental light in the coop to keep production up. We decided we are not going to do that only because we are not dependent on having the large volume of eggs. They will lay when they lay! Also, you will want to collect your eggs more frequently to prevent them from freezing. Adding straw to the egg boxes helps for a little bit of extra insulation.  Lastly, the hens wanted to celebrate the holiday season too so we added some lights to the outside of the coop! We turn them off at "bed time" so they can get some rest. It is a fun and festive way to jazz up the outside of the coop.

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!!

The Deep Litter Method

       When looking into what type of bedding we wanted to use for the coop we found a simple yet effective technique called the Deep Litter Method. They suggest that pine shavings for bedding are the best to use. You would not want to purchase cedar shavings because those have led to respiration problems with chickens. They also recommend when using the Deep Litter Method you will want to mix the bedding with diatomaceous earth (DE). Make sure you purchase the food grade diatomaceous earth because if the hens consume it, it gets passed to their eggs which you eat, so you want to make sure it is safe for you as well. DE also is helpful in preventing mites, fleas and ticks in the coop and on the chickens. It is a natural bug repellent. We actually sprinkle some around the outside of our house to keep ants and spiders at bay. It works!  They also mention that if you mix some in the chickens feed it helps to keep their eggs clean while they lay. It is a very safe product all around.

 To build up your litter you first want to add about 4-6 inches of pine shavings to your coop floor. Then take some of the DE and sprinkle it over the top surface area of the pine shavings. Now you could mix it in yourself or let the chickens do it when the scratch while they are in there. Either way is fine. I prefer to mix it in myself. Pine shavings are good for soaking up any moisture and the DE helps to keep the bedding dry. It dries up the chickens droppings so the ammonia in the air is low which helps with the chickens health and keeps the smell of the coop fresh. After a while, the bedding will begin to break down. Essentially you are creating a compost inside the chicken coop. You will want to stir the bedding (I do it daily) with a yard rake or pitch fork. The chickens will mix it up when they are inside the coop, but free-range chickens tend to not mix it enough because they are not in there as often. You want to make sure it is not matted down otherwise the break down process will not work correctly. You will noticed if it needs to be rotated because it will look dusty in the coop and the bedding on top will be too dry as opposed to the bedding on the bottom. Each week or every other week you can add another inch or so of bedding to freshen it up and to begin to build the layers. Theoretically, you are supposed to only have to change their bedding in the coop once a year with the deep litter method. It is very safe and sanitary in both respects for the chickens. We will be changing ours every 6 months which is just a personal preference.

  Typically, you would want to change the bedding as the seasons change. We are doing ours during the fall and then will change it again in the spring. I read that in the summer you want to keep the bedding layers a little lighter than you would in the winter because it does add extra insulation. Which is great when it is freezing temperatures to help keep the hens warm but dreadful when its 90 and the chickens are trying to keep cool. So the bedding in our coop during the summer and into fall was light but we have began to beef it up a bit because winter is right around the corner.

 You will also notice that the scent in the coop will begin to smell earthy. That is the best way I can describe it which is normal. If it smells like ammonia that is not a good thing. I would suggest cleaning the coop out and trying again if that happens. The Deep Litter Method is not for everyone. If you prefer to change the bedding more frequently that is perfectly fine. We just found that this is a safe, sanitary, and even a highly-cost effective way to do it. Not to mention it saves a good amount of time too!

 

Chicken Run

Recently, the little chicken ladies turned seven months old. Now that they are older and officially comfortable with their surroundings one of their favorite things to do is go exploring. They are always out on the prowl to find new places to scratch, peck for snacks, and take dirt baths. When they first were placed outside they were timid. Always stayed in a group and usually remained in one small portion of the yard. Not anymore! They each have developed their own personalities and do not mind at times breaking off from the group to do their own thing.
  At first, Cory and I were fine with this because they always found their way back to the coop at dusk. We would leave them out for a while when we ran errands so they were free ranging for most of the day which they enjoyed. This was all until I encountered the fox and we realized they were getting into things that they should not be. For example, they loved laying and eating all of the flowers out of the flower pots I had put together. Which I was not very fond of! Haha. We decided it was time for fencing. Our goal was to create an area around the coop that was large enough for the chickens to range in. With that in mind, right now since we are around the house when they are outside we were not building a fence to keep predators out but more to keep the chickens in. Eventually, we will develop our fencing more with bird netting etc. to keep predators out but we wanted to create a basic fencing foundation first.
      Fencing can be quiet expensive if you have to purchase everything for the store, however, it is still an option! Luckily for us, Cory is very creative when it comes to projects like this so we were able to do this at an affordable cost. The fencing itself we found for free. The wire portion we found at our local town transfer station; someone had graciously set it aside! We also incorporated some wooden fencing that was set out for free in the neighborhood. The fence posts, Cory had cut down small trees from the back woods earlier in the year. To create a gate, we will be using a portion of the wooden fence with some hinges, a lock, handles, and a wheel on the bottom to help support some weight and improve moment for opening and closing. This will allow us access to the coop and run as well as an easy way to occasionally let the chickens out to range in the rest of the yard.

This is what the post hole auger looked like

Once all of the materials were gathered the first step was to dig the holes for the posts. We rented a post hole auger and every eight feet around the coop we dug down two feet to create the holes. The area ended up being 24x24 which is plenty of room for the tiny girls. The posts were set in a mixture of cement and dirt. We wanted to make sure they were sturdy enough to hold the fencing and the gate once we put them up. We let the posts set overnight.
  The next day it was time to add the fencing. Across the back area of the coop towards the woods we used a large portion of the wooden fencing because the ground was more level and that is where the chickens tended to "break out" of the coop area. The rest of the way around we use the wire fencing. We did stack two layers of wire fencing behind the coop next to the wooden portion just to make sure they would not try and fly out. It does also provide a barrier for predators even though that was not our main concern at this time. Our woods is the home to many hungry creatures so any means to protect the chickens is always helpful.
   There are three chickens that I like to refer to as the three amigos; Betty, Luna and Dumpling. They are always the three that break out of the coop area to go roam around the rest of the yard. They never seems to want to follow the rules! Haha. No matter how many barriers we tried to create they always managed to find a way out. However, now that we have the official fencing up they have been staying all together which has helped lower our anxiety levels and puts our minds at ease. Knowing they are safer while they are outside is a great benefit to building the fencing!

Snack Time!!

 

 

    Who doesn't love snack time? I sure do! The rule of thumb when giving chickens a snack is to not feed them anything that you would not eat yourself. That means if you have something that has expired it is suggested to not feed that to your hens.  I was doing some research to see what types of snacks that chickens could eat and if there was anything in particular that is not good for them. So far, what I have seen is they can pretty much have anything. I would not advise you go out and get them a snickers bar, but giving them fruits, vegetables and even scrambled eggs would be delicious treats that they would enjoy. I would give the girls scrambled eggs every once in a while when they were babies to make sure they were getting enough protein. Recently, I found that one of their favorite snacks are mealworms. You can buy live mealworms to feed them but that freaked me out so we got the dried ones. They come in a bag that you can purchase at your local pet or tractor supply store. They are obsessed with them. There are several different varieties that you can buy when it comes to mealworms which I found interesting. They are like the potato chips for chickens haha! There are mealworms that are plain, or you can purchase a mix. Mealworms with corn, mealworms with sunflower seeds etc.

   I also use these bag of mealworms to my advantage as well. I taught the girls that as soon as I start shaking the bag they all start running towards it and then I sprinkle a bunch on the ground and it turns into a feeding frenzy. It is hilarious watching them all sprinting over to the sounds of the shaking bag. They come flying around the corner or down the ramp of the coop to get a taste of their favorite treat. When we first fed it to them we would put some in our hands and let them peck at it but that led to them climbing all over each other and to be honest their pecks hurt a little bit. Placing them on the ground is much easier and creates less of a mess.

What's on your beak Peanut?

  Snacks can also be used as boredom busters. I was doing some looking around on my favorite chicken website Backyard Chickens to try and gather some ideas of what to give them in the Winter since I am assuming they will not want to be outside as much due to the cold. ( I could be proven wrong on this since this will be our first winter with the ladies so stay tuned). However, I read that you can get a head of lettuce and tie it inside the coop with a string so it hangs and the chickens will peck at it for hours. It is a nice treat and a way to occupy their time so they do not begin to pick on each other. Another one I would like to try is putting feed or a chicken “snack mix” into a water bottle with holes that they can peck at. Kind of like those treat toys you can purchase for your dog. The ones that they pat around and bite and eventually a treat falls out. I want to do something similar to that since they love to scratch their feet and peck at things. You can mix anything together and put it in there. I was thinking about corn, raisins, maybe dried fruit. I also recently purchased a treat square. It has sunflower seeds and mealworms compacted together so the chickens can peck and scratch at it and break it apart. I have not give it to the girls yet but I am fairly certain they are going to love it!

They all come together for snack time!

  Now I do not give the chickens snacks every day because I do not want their healthy lifestyles to become unhealthy by being over fed. However, every few days they get some mealworms or left over fruit and veggies. We will want to monitor the amount of snacks they get in the winter if they are not getting as much exercise because that could lead to other problems with their legs, overall health etc. Chickens are already known to consume more food and water in the winter as a means to help keep themselves warm without snacks included.  

    Also, when giving them treats make sure you size them down so they are easy for the chickens to swallow and digest. They get so excited trying to eat it they almost swallow the food whole so make sure it is portioned small enough that the do not have any issues. Happy Snacking!

      

How to Beat the Heat

With Summer officially over and Fall beginning I wanted to share with you about how the chickens were able to beat the heat this season. We did have a pretty hot summer this year and since the girls are not one to jump into the lake or a swimming pool, they needed to find other means in order to stay cool.

 Here is how you can help your girls! Make sure the hens always have access to fresh water and shade.  Even if they are out in the run during the day, if they have an area out of the sun and a place to get a nice drink that will help immensely keeping them comfortable. If it is a really hot day you could even add a few ice cubes to their water to cool it down for them. We had a few days that were in the 90’s and unfortunately we could not stay home from work and let them be outside of the coop. Cory came up with the great idea of putting Gatorade in their water. This gave them extra electrolytes and made their water tasty and refreshing. I did later on purchase a powder that does the same thing from the local tractor supply store that you can mix in their water. I have not had to use it yet since the temperature has cooled down but it will be nice to have on hand for next year.

       Fortunately, we live in a wooded area so the trees help provide natural shade that the girls can lay under. Also the hens always have access to the coop if they want to get out of the sun. You will see that sometimes they will find other alternatives for shade if they do not want to go back into the coop. I have found them all sitting under our cars or laying in the dirt behind some fencing. Finding areas where the ground is cool and where they can relax, some even take a quick dirt bath.

   Believe it or not though, the girls actually enjoy laying in the direct sunlight. It is like they are trying to get a little chicken tan. They lay down on the driveway or in the yard and fluff up their feathers. Usually they are leaning to one side and they just hang out. If they feel themselves starting to get too hot, you will see them fan themselves with one of their wings. Not only will the stay in the sun, but when more than one hen is laying down they are practically on top of each other. I do not think they could get any closer if their tried. You would think they would want some space in such heat. It must be sisterly love! Hehe.
  Lastly, another thing I have done is put the hose on the mist setting and just spray it over them. It was a little surprising to me that they actually seem to like walking or running through it since usually they do not like to get wet.

Egg Knowledge

Now that we are up to six laying Hens (wahoo!) I wanted to give you guys a little more information about what I have learned so far about laying hens and the eggs in particular.

 Let’s start with the egg boxes. As mentioned in pervious posts, you want to make sure you have one egg box per 3-4 chickens. Cory built three into our coop so the girls have plenty of room to lay. Make sure you keep the bedding in there clean and fresh so when they lay, the eggs remain sanitary. Some other chicken owners suggested using straw in the egg boxes so the hens have something to nestle down into. They like to feel hidden when laying so that could be a good solution instead of having them venture off into the brush of the woods to lay (which one of our girls attempted to do when she first started laying.) We just use the pine shaving that we have in the rest of the coop currently. I just make sure they are changed out more frequently.

  The girls who are laying naturally just took to laying in the egg boxes. They are a little cramped looking and stay nice and dark which is what the chickens prefer. You will find a few random eggs out in the coop sometimes, or they will even lay outside in the lawn if they are having their “play time” which is fine.

  I also noticed, that once several of them are starting to lay, they tend to lay their eggs close to each other in the egg boxes. If you have a broody hen, they are known to roll all the eggs into one spot and sit on them to keep them warm. It’s a motherly instinct. Even though our eggs are not fertilized since we do not own a Rooster, sometime the hens will lay on the eggs for a while.

 After the girls have laid their eggs, particularly the Barred Rocks and the Buff Orpingtons they make a loud squawking noise. It is almost like they are sounding the alarms to let us know that they have laid their egg. Sometimes you can tell when they are about to lay because they will pace back and forth out of the egg box and make the same sound just a little quieter. Pacing is a common characteristic you will noticed when the hens are getting ready to lay. They will also try and seclude themselves from the group. This is how I noticed that the barred rock and the second buff orpington were about to lay their first eggs, I just had a hunch and I happened to be right! 

 The first eggs you receive from you hens could be smaller in size than what you are use to seeing. This will change over time as they become more mature. We were surprised when we saw that the White Leghorns eggs were normal in size when they started to lay.

  Also, White leghorns typically lay white eggs.  I believe they are one of the only white chickens that actually produce white eggs. All of our other hens should produce brown shelled eggs.

 Sometimes the eggs will have spots, be rough in texture, or have different color shells. That is all normal depending on what breed of chickens you have.

We have also noticed that the shells are thicker and harder than store bought eggs. Part of it has to do with the type of diet the chicken is on. If they have the benefit of being free-range on top of having great layer feed they have the opportunity to grab other nutrients from the ground that other chickens might not have.  Also, depending on how recent the eggs were laid (how fresh they are) can depict on how tough the shell will be to crack. If they are fresh out of the egg box the membrane inside the shell has not had time to detach from the shell inside so it will be a little harder to break the shell. Nothing too noticeable though. If the shells are hard and thick the chicken is in good health!  As the chicken ages, the shells may become thinner.. but I am hoping that is  years down the road. If you feel that your egg shells are too thin you can supplement some oyster shells into the chickens diet. They might just need a calcium boost since they use so much once they start

laying. The other benefit of having strong shells is they will not break as easily in the coop if they are not laid on a soft surface.

    I did do some research on how to properly store the eggs. Some chicken owners keep them outside of the fridge. I perfect to keep them in the fridge just to be safe. Also, we wash our eggs right before use instead of right after the hens lay. Only because there is a protective coating on them that helps preserve the egg. However, if we gave you eggs already, we washed them before we gave them too you! Which is okay to do as well. J 

 

The first round of eggs we made for breakfast!

We Need a Bigger House

So many exciting things have been happening these past few months that I forgot to show everyone the chickens second home before the coop.
  The first brooder we had for them was great. It was the perfect size for baby chicks. However, when they began to enter what I called their "teenage" phases they needed more room. They were easily hopping out of the first brooder and began to peck at each other again because the space they were in was too confined at this point. Their feathers were not fully developed just yet so we were not comfortable putting them in the main coop. Luckily, Cory had another ammo crate that was significantly larger that the first brooder. I cannot say that it is common for the chickens to have more than one home before they go out into the coop, but ours did! In home number two the girls had more room to run around during the day and had areas that they could go without being right next to each other.
  In this brooder they really started to become more comfortable roosting on the edges and flying from one point to another. The design of it was almost exactly the same as the first brooder except obviously the size of it was larger. We still used the shredded newspaper for the bedding because that was working out great for us. We did however, put in their full sized feeder so we did not have to fill the food every day with using the chick feeder because they were eating a ton now that they were getting bigger. We still have to change out their water every day because we still had not found a waterer that we like that would not leak every where but that was easy enough. I will say we tried a hamster feeder because the chickens like to peck at things and they were able to get the water out of it easily, but even that started leaking and making a mess.

  The top was covered with chicken wire which we removed when we were around to give them time to stretch and play around outside of the brooder in the garage for a bit. We kept the heat lamp on them for awhile since they still got chills at night. You could tell when their feathers were fully developed because they no longer would go under the heat lamp and we were able to turn it off. The weather was also changing at that point and the temperature was getting warmer which helped.
  Since the chickens were growing so quickly we also changed their feed. When the were chicks we got the Chick feed by Nutrena because it was smaller in size, called crumbles and it contained medication that helped support their growth since their immune systems were still gaining strength.  The feed that we switched to and use now was still made by Nutrena is called layer feed which is pellet sized. It helps chickens that will be laying eggs by providing them with the necessary nutrients they need for producing eggs and digesting their food.
  Below are a few other photos of home number two and the goofy girls who stole my heart!